Writes Of Passage: Words To Read Before You Turn 13, Selected by Nicolette Jones
Published by Nosy Crow
FROM the children’s book reviewer for the Sunday Times, comes a collection of pieces of writing with particular relevance to young people.
This is a book made up of song lyrics, poetry and extracts from books and speeches written by all different kinds of people in different times and yet they are connected. They connect in the way that all people do –
in the sense that throughout time and circumstance we will all grow up feeling similar things.
This is part of the many lessons Nicolette Jones has put across not with condescension but with empathy.
What is so appealing about this book to those who do not fit within the target audience is that we have all been 13 once. It is the exact time you need advice most, and to be reassured that you are not alone in the discovery of emotions far more complex than any before.
The space between being a child and an adult is one where you long, in part, for both the ease and fun of childhood and the independence of adulthood.
Among the many topics raised here, one is accepting the importance of both in your life, of learning to be kind and responsible and to make your way through the rest of life without forgetting the whimsy and magic that so many begin to lose as they get older.
Jones has, between the lines of each carefully chosen piece of writing, created something new and deeply valuable – a message of support for those experiencing a transitional period of life that is both exciting and nerve wracking in equal parts.
The content is varied and cohesive, exploring the thoughts of some of the greatest minds on timeless topics of identity, pain, joy, and, as this does as a whole, looking to the past and the future with a sense of hope and determination.
Alongside each included extract is a comment by Jones either on her reasons for choosing it or simply her thoughts on what it means and how it relates to the larger theme. These serve as a guide through the book that feels conversational and thoughtful.
The key to this book’s success is understanding. It is so often that children and particularly the books written for them are dismissed as naive and a thing so definitively of the past for those who have grown up but there is care here to send the opposite message.
Children and young people experience the same world as everyone else and have thoughts on and reactions to these things not tainted by a sense of cynicism at the world. It is only through reading and considering children’s books that one can observe how they’re not so different from what we see in real life. Young people can and do come to understand the things that matter in life, the concepts of love, self discovery, sadness and recovery and they do so through books such as this and those featured in it.
